Fleurdelis

It is true, characterization is everything, but it is easier to be convincing in one's characterization if there are also some physical attributes that go with the role.

As for Kovaleva, I might probably be more convinced by her tall Giselle, if she ever dances that role, than by her recent cutesy Myrtha.

I have not seen that many great Myrthas, to be fair. In my mind, the perfect ballerina for this role would have been Veronica Part (don't know if she ever danced Myrtha or not), who has both the substantial height and the solemn monumental countenance to create the stern, powerful and unforgiving character that in my mind is needed here. A bit like the Mother Russia monument from Volgograd. At the Bolshoi the closest I can see to that is Stepanova, who is, however, of smaller height.

On 11/24/2017 at 8:39 PM, mnacenani said:

Recent post by Catherine Pawlick on the Smirnova-Chudin-Kavalyova Giselle of November 11th. Read her remarks regarding Alyona's Myrtha debut - now I'm twice sorry that I missed this completely :  http://www.vaganovatoday.com/grigorovichs-giselle-bolshoi-ballet

I saw it. I give her credit for trying and doing it with a lot of composure and poise, which compensated for the sometimes obvious lack of experience. But as a casting decision it was a huge blunder that she had no hope of overcoming. I am sorry, but I could not bring myself to be convinced by a Myrtha with Alyona's angelic baby face, as hard as she might have tried to look stern and powerful. Even her height, which one would think would give her an advantage here, was of no help. 

And she needs to do A LOT of work on her hands, which right now are way too stiff and unsightly in the way she positions them. I saw this earlier in some of her photos, which I thought were just poor shots, unfortunately, I then saw the same thing live.

On 12/1/2017 at 7:03 AM, mtthwbrehm said:

Tsiskaridze founded a committee to ensure the correct teaching of Vaganova's teaching. None of his recent graduates have taken on a Moscow style. 

Without a committee founded by Mr. Tsiskaridze, they had no clue at Vaganova about the "correct teaching of Vaganova's teaching", no doubt.

On 11/24/2017 at 11:25 PM, Buddy said:

Olga Smirnova

“Carmen Suite” (dance with the matador)

Ballet Globe Gala Geneva
November 23, 02017


**** Absolutely The Greatest  !!!! ****

I was hoping for a lot. This was more than that !

There were many excellent performances including her own Sleeping Beauty duet, but this eclipsed everything.

I’m still more or less speechless. 

http://www.theatreduleman.com/index.php?m=0&s=3&agId=1005

Agh, was this a link to the video of the performance? Such a tease, and now... nothing... :-(

My impressions from the broadcast are virtually the same as Quinten's. Krysanova was highly confident and competent, especially in the last act, where she effortlessly wove her dance steps together with vibrant, lighthearted comedic acting. But as Medora she lacked that special type of feminine beauty and charm that can make one believe that all these male characters would go crazy over her, the irresistible appeal that Julie Kent or Svetlana Zakharova possessed in that role, or someone like Olga Smirnova could have brought to the character. I am surprised that people did not find Stepanova as convincing a Medora, I thought she would fit the role pretty well, but I never saw her, so cannot tell.

I was really disappointed by the odalisques. Turazashvili was totally out of synch with every single musical accent, Ibraimova displayed a ton of sloppy, unsightly movements and poses, and only Zhiganshina won me over with her radiant countenance, though I feel that doing lengthy preparations before her pirouettes was not really how that piece should have been danced as they were breaking the continuity of the sequence of movements.

Very pleasantly impressed by Artem Belyakov: such elegance, composure, nobility!

Overall, despite the claims to authenticity, I could not help but being jarred by some pretty ugly movements that popped here and there in the choreography, something I do not normally notice in tried and true Petipa classics such as Swan Lake or La Bayadere. I get the feeling this is a lot more Burlaka-Ratmansky than genuine Petipa.

But by that time she had already left the Berlin Ballet, an even more curious move if she indeed had planned to keep a permanent home in Berlin.

And is it really so impossible to raise a child in the US?

1 minute ago, Fleurdelis said:

 

I have found it a bit curious that on the Berlin State Ballet website main page, the main feature is the list of "all dates with Polina Semionova". In essence, they are singling out her performances as the most noteworthy ones on the schedule.  And she is not even a permanent member of the company, just a guest artist.

Now, she is a very fine ballerina and all, but such cowering before a primadonna, no matter how famous and talented, is disrespectful to the active principals of the company, who are thus implicitly treated as of lesser importance. And self-deprecating for the company itself, which in effect is admitting that its main draw is a guest artist, rather than its dancers, choreographers, stage productions, repertoire, style, traditions, etc.

I am still surprised about her departure from ABT. Was it because she was not well received in the US, or was it the company that did not measure up to her talents?

Just for future reference:

Zakharova

Krysanova

Nikulina

Obraztsova

Smirnova

Stashkevich

Stepanova

Shipulina

Volchkov

Lantratov

Lobukhin

Lopatin

Ovcharenko

Rodkin

Skvortsov

Chudin

Anything else is alternative facts.

1 hour ago, mnacenani said:

 

She is Russkaya - Moscow ballet writer and lecturer. However, there might be more than one

acceptable way of pronouncing Russian words or names, as there is no accent shown in writing.

I am certain the Russian presenter said "Hahlava" on tv although I feel it should be "Hah-lova".

Especially confounding is the letter "yo" (e with two dots on top for anyone not familiar) which are

99 % of the time not shown in print and one is supposed to know. If you remember the extended

discussion on whether it is Kovaleva or Kavalyova when I introduced Alena/Alyona on this forum

earlier this year.

Sorry, it is Khokhlova and Stepanova, there are no other possible ways have the stresses in these particular Russian last names. Maybe only in Czech ones. 

The ë is a totally different matter.

20 hours ago, mnacenani said:

 

Could I have a point, or could I be totally mistaken, in thinking Ratmansky has something

in common with Wheeldon, namely style and FX over substance ?

I get the same feeling about them two when it comes to full length ballets.

In shorter forms Ratmansky is simply amazing.

20 hours ago, mnacenani said:

 

No, it was Darya they were talking about on "Balshoy Ballet" or similar program. However, I just asked my

friend Vita in Moscow to voice message me the three names above, and she said "Hah-lova", "Stipanova"

and "Sivinard" so it's almost a full match vs your suggestion - thanks for the tip.

It is Stipanava. Your friend Vita is not Russian, is she?

8 minutes ago, mnacenani said:

 

You are welcome, I am not a know-all. I heard Darya's surname pronounced as "Hahlava" on Russian TV, but my

friend Vita says "Hahlova" which may be the correct pronounciation. Will take you tip re the other two.

"Hahlava" sounds like a Georgian last name. Maybe on Russian TV they were talking about some Georgian ballerina.

17 hours ago, mnacenani said:

 with Hahlava as Gulnare


 

I am going to deduct a full point from your review score for your incorrect distortion of the English transcription of Darya's last name. It is stress-less vowels that get pronounced differently, here the stress is on the second syllable, so the second vowel should still be an "o".

Yes, and it should also be "Stipanava" and "Sivinard"

7 hours ago, mnacenani said:

 

Mauvaise langue !!  So it is Katyusha after all - you have insider info or something ??

 

No, I have a crystal ball. And you shall live a long and prosperous life.

Interesting article, though the photographs accompanying it raise lots of questions, nice jumps, but her hands look terrible, on the one from the black pas de deux with the prince it looks as if she is flipping the sign of the horns, as if she were at a Motley Cru concert. Will give her schooling the benefit of the doubt and lay the blame on the photographer, but the author could have used better judgment when selecting pictures for the article.

Hope you will enjoy Krysanova.

6 hours ago, mnacenani said:

Re remuneration of dancers : at the time of the Bolshoy Filin acid incident it was said/written that the bad blood resulted

from Filin not casting Dmitrichenko's then "partnyor" Vorontsova (currently principal at Mixailovskiy) leaving her skint, as

at the time dancers did not have a salary and were paid on piecework.

To be precise, Vorontsova danced quite aplenty under Filin, the issue was that he did not give her the lead role in Swan Lake that she coveted, not that she could not make a proper living.

1 minute ago, MadameP said:

 

???  But ... Vaganova newbies do not represent the Moscow style.

They do now :-P

13 hours ago, mnacenani said:

 

But maybe I should have looked at the repertory page more closely : this pinnacle

of Russian opera, which I had seen at the ROH in 1990 in its full 5 act, 4½ hour version

has been butchered and cut down to 2:45 hours by butcher Lybimov, who should be

flogged, drawn and quartered for this blasphemy.

Too late, Lyubimov died not long after staging this opera. Cutting Prince Igor down to a more manageable size is a long-standing practice, but I agree that what Lyubimov did was nothing short of barbarity, he collaborated with a modern composer who had the gall to actually rewrite the Borodin/Glazunov/Rimsky-Korsakov score, thinking he could do it better!!! The recent version at the Met was also an abomination. But the Polovtsian Dances, especially the versions created by Fokine and by Goleizovski, are a true landmark in dance history.

On 9/24/2017 at 5:24 PM, MadameP said:

 

I too am sad to see the Moscow style diluted, and understand your point about "mediocre" Vaziev wielding great control over careers of dancers more talented than him, BUT ... in comparison with the completely non-existent dance talent and career of Yuri Fateev at Mariinsky, Vaziev would quality as a genius of dance ... 

Not to worry. The Moscow style will be coming back in with the Vaganova newbies from now on, courtesy of Professor Tsiskaridze.

On 9/29/2017 at 2:52 PM, mnacenani said:

. What's

more I will be seeing Smirnova the next evening to compare characterisation and

execution. Casting for these two "Korsar"s in case anyone is interested :

 

http://www.bolshoi.ru/en/performances/198/roles/#20171018190000

http://www.bolshoi.ru/en/performances/198/roles/#20171019190000

 

Except that things may not always work out as planned. The Corsair dates are absent on Smirnova's official website. 

A peculiar pairing, to say the least. Sometimes I think that Vaziev makes his casting decisions by throwing darts at dancers' names on a wall. Blindfolded.

I did see it as her just "copping a feel". Overall, their relationship rather reminds me of Mr. and Mrs. Smith with Brad and Angelina, except that in one case the relationship is just beginning, and in the other it is being rekindled. Don't know if I'd call it terribly romantic though.

18 hours ago, Helene said:

The foundation of both of their styles was the Imperial school, however, even the Vaganova site credits her with creating the school's method of pedagogy.  And of course Petipa liked tricks, but they were placed in context.  What came concurrently with his last years -- he was especially displeased with Gorshkov's staging of Don Q in Moscow -- and after him was both a change from the symmetry and style that is reflected in the descriptions and notations and that context. Under Vaganova it modernized, but like  the Peking Ballet that toured the US in the '70's, with lots of acrobatics and without those pesky musical interludes that audiences, especially Western audiences, didn't get.

 

Petipa was defined by the combination of mime and dance, and mime was integral to his long, leisurly ballets.  What is actually left from the Petipa, despite all of the ballets that are attributed to him?

You are referring to the English version of Vaganova's bio on the site, which contains a number of inaccuracies and leaves one wondering whether their author as chosen for her knowledge of English, rather than knowledge of ballet history, and why the administration of the Academy is taking such a cavalier attitude towards the quality of material on its website.

If we refer to the Russian version of the site, which I would consider more definitive since it is written in the mother tongue and is, thus, more thorough and less prone to incorrect word choices, we will read the following:

Vaganova's method has become the most famous one in world ballet teaching. What is its significance? Perhaps, it is the well-known dancer, choreographer, teacher and artistic director of the Academy of Russian Ballet Igor Belsky who has captured the very essence: "Vaganova did not invent anything new in movements. She collated everything that came before her, mainly using the lessons of Olga Preobrazhenska. There were good teachers before Vaganova, but they taught intuitively, while she systematized their techniques and compiled a method for a gradual teaching of classical dance. The French school had hanging elbows, the Italian - elbows that were too tense. Vaganova fused the French softness with the Italian precision of arms, found the middle way, and out of it came the Russian school. Another important accomplishment of Vaganova, together with Fyodor Lopukhov, was that amidst the ruin of post-revolutionary Russia they managed to preserve Russian ballet - its repertoire, its school and its professional mastery"

So, by synthesizing the achievements of different schools and teachers, Vaganova did not invent anything substantially new. What was new was her approach to the system of teaching classical dance.

As for Petipa, he is most remembered by lavish, grand spectacles that were his ballets, and the memorable dance scenes, like the Shades in the Bayadere or the black PDD in Swan Lake, mime was just a filler between dance scenes. As for placing tricks in context, often a ballerina's desire to highlight her special skills in a ballet, any ballet, was more than enough context for him. He freely changed his ballets to accommodate the desires of his ballerinas, for example in Swan Lake he liberally inserted and removed pieces specifically at the request of Karpakova, Sobeschanska, Kalmykova - this is how much "context" meant to him. 

But you are right about the fact that most of the Petipa ballets we see today around the world probably have very little of the original Petipa left in them. But the imperial Russian ballet style of St. Petersburg has been preserved thanks to Vaganova and at the Academy that bears her name, that is, unless the current Muscovite leadership does not eventually put an end to it.

As for Don Quixote, Vaganova had nothing to do with it, it was Fyodor Lopukhov that staged DQ at the Mariinsky/Kirov back then, and she actually clashed with him over his fondness for acrobatics. Neither am I aware of her having anything to do with the Peking Ballet.